


cream, no sugar

by SerpentineJ



Category: DC Animated Universe, DC Cinematic Universe, DCU, DCU (Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-15
Updated: 2016-05-24
Packaged: 2018-06-08 14:51:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,918
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6859480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SerpentineJ/pseuds/SerpentineJ
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Detective's Coffee is a charming local coffee shop where the brew is always hot, the pastries are always fresh, the bald man who owns the place only stops by to criticize loudly once a week, and the staff try to juggle overly complicated coffee machines and irrationally demanding customers with year-old Groupons.</p><p>Welcome to retail. It's not pretty.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. act i: "i need a chocolate croissant."

**Author's Note:**

> NOTE: i've only worked in retail a little, and never in a coffee shop, so apologies for any discrepancies.
> 
> idk how long this is gonna be? or even if i'll finish it? just putting it out there haha bc i don't really have an endgame in mind yet and i'm posting as i write, and im infamous for never finishing anything, so.
> 
> posting this now, but due to comments on my last superbat fic, i might go back and add an epilogue to that one...

"Clark!"  
  
Diana's voice cuts through the almost-peaceful silence Clark has been attempting to enjoy.

"Goddamnit." He mutters, then raises his voice. "Yeah, Di?"

"Come here!"

He gets up off his stool and pauses for a moment to savor the sight of the tiny, pristine, quiet kitchen, before brushing through the plastic drapes that lead to behind the coffee counter where Diana's standing.

"Yeah?" Clark repeats.

Diana's scowling fiercely at the new chrome monstrosity Luthor had bought for the shop only a week ago.

"I need you to hold this open." She gestures to a spring-loaded hatch in the side of the machine. "The goddamn tank is so hard to get out-"

"Alright, alright." Clark tries to placate her, propping the small door open while she begins to pull at the water tank. It's empty. "Did we get the latest shipment in okay last night?"

Diana doesn't look at him. "Yeah." She says. "Conner and Tim took care of it. Everything's where it should be."

The tank finally gives way with a thunk, popping out, sloshing drops of dregs over the sides with the sudden motion.

"Jesus." Diana grunts. Clark lets the hatch swing shut, and Diana goes to the sink to fill the tank.

Clark looks on sympathetically. What was wrong with the old machine? Reliable, made good coffee, had to be smacked every once in a while, but easy to use- who knows. Luthor's decision.

"Where's Bruce?" He asks, checking the syrup bottles. "He's usually in before both of us. The scones aren't gonna be ready by opening." It'll be okay. He started the dough already, once he saw Bruce hadn't.

Diana frowns. "No idea." She says. "Try calling him."

Clark takes out his phone, and moves into the body of the shop, dialing Bruce and checking the tables for crumbs at the same time. (As he remembered, Wally had been in charge of closing last night. The kid's fast, but not as thorough as one would wish.)

Bruce picks up.

"Hello?" He doesn't sound groggy, and Clark knows Bruce knows it's him, that bastard doesn't pick up the phone without checking caller ID.

"Bruce, are you coming in today?" He asks.

Someone knock on the glass door.

"Yeah." Bruce says voice tinny through the speakers on his phone. "I'm on the way, be there in ten."

"Hello?" It's a woman, middle-aged, big purse, short hair, rapping obnoxiously on the window. "Hello, are you open?"

"Christ- hold on a second, Bruce." Clark glances back to the counter. There's no-one there. Diana must have gone to the back. Shit. "Ma'am? Ma'am, I'm sorry, we're not open."

"What?" The woman says through the door, frowning. "You're inside, you must be open. I just need a chocolate croissant, would you let me in for a second?"

Clark sighs internally. "Ma'am, we open at seven on weekdays." He points at the sign dangling on the door. Weekdays, 7-9, it reads. She barely glances at it.

"But you're already inside." She repeats, more emphatically, as though he were hard of hearing, or didn't understand. "I need a chocolate croissant."

"Clark?" He hears Bruce's voice coming from his phone, which is pressed to his chest while he tries to persuade this woman that they're not open yet. "Clark, are you still there?"

He brings the phone to his ear for a second. "Yeah, Bruce, I'm still here, would you just- hold on a sec? Thanks."

The woman's face twists in surprise, then outrage. "I knew it!" She says, loudly enough to be heard clearly through the glass door. "I knew it! You're open, and you just want to keep talking on the phone!"

Christ. Clark presses his phone to his chest again. "Ma'am, the sign says we're not open yet." He states, more firmly. "It's six-thirty am, we don't open until seven."

"Liar." The woman insists. "I want to speak to your manager."

Clark nearly sighs out loud.

"Ma'am." He repeats. He's starting to lose his patience, because it's six-thirty, he hasn't had coffee or food, and this woman is getting on his nerves. Growing up on a farm made the first two easy, but chickens and goats didn't insist that their handful of grain and seeds had the wrong ratio of caramel syrup and whipped cream, and was he sure this was nonfat soy milk? "My manager's not here yet. Because we're not open."

The woman huffs, and crosses her arms. "Fine." She says imperiously. "Fine. Just know I won't ever be coming back. You've lost a customer with your lazy service."

Clark does exhale in relief when she turns around and leaves.

He picks his phone back up.

"Bruce?" He says.

The line's dead.

Bruce has hung up.

_Goddamnit._


	2. act ii: "i ordered skim milk."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> NOTE: next chapter! thank u guys for your comments!

"Took you long enough." Diana calls over the rim of one of her signatures, the Wonder Woman- two shots of espresso, a dose of Thai coffee, hot milk, one pump of caramel, one pump of raspberry, and whipped cream. Diana style. (Clark tried a sip once and nearly choked. Coffee with a kick, she calls it. Bruce calls it a death wish.)  
  
Bruce closes the door behind him. They're almost ready to open. Clark must be in the back.

"Sorry." He says gruffly. "Got caught up in some research."

"Yeah, you're lucky Clark's saving your ass." Diana replies. "He's covered your bakery shift for now, but I need him out here when customers start coming in, so you're not off the hook."

_Ah, Christ._

"Yeah, yeah." Bruce mutters, striding behind the counter, grabbing his apron off of the coat hook by the doorway to the back kitchen. "Clark!"

He walks through the plastic sheets curtaining the opening.

Clark looks up. He's a bit of a mess, sleeves rolled up, glasses sliding off his nose, covered lightly in flour, batter smudged on his forearms, wrist-deep in scone dough.

"The Dark Knight finally deigns to return to his lowly place of employment." He snarks. A light smile tugs at the corners of his mouth.

"Shut up." Bruce rolls his eyes and washes his hands, wipes them on his apron. "And stop it with that 'Dark Knight' bullshit, would you? Makes me sound like a goddamn superhero." He shoves Clark gently out of the way and lays his hands on the dough. It's pretty good. Nothing like his, and he can bet it's three times sweeter than anything he's baked since he was thirteen, but that's how Clark works.

"Well, I bet you'd look great in spandex." Clark parries, and elbows him back. "Hey, maybe if you show up on time tomorrow, I won't make fun of you." He moves to the ovens to check on the batch that should be coming out right about- now. 

Yup. They look nice, golden-brown and lightly sugared. Clark takes them out with one gloved hand and sets them out onto the countertop for cooling.

"I'm always on time." Bruce grumbles. "This was a fluke."

Clark raises an eyebrow. "Get caught up researching- what was it, again?"

"Electromagnetic fields and their effects on ferrous materials and electron flow." Bruce replies easily.

Clark rolls his eyes. "Show off."

They're broken from their regular, easy banter when the jingle of a bell cuts through the air, the sound familiar and jarring at the same time.

"Well." Clark sighs, taking off his glasses, grabbing a clean corner of Bruce's apron to wipe futilely at the lenses. "Time to go to work."

"Get out of here." Bruce says, a sardonic edge to his voice. "And take those scones with you."

~~~~~~

"One large peppermint mocha, one medium vanilla latte." Diana mutters, scrawling the names and the orders on a pair of cups. "Kent!"

"Yeah!" He takes the order, harried, trying to cap a ridiculously complex caramel cappuccino- skim, with foamed milk instead of whipped cream and an extra shot of hazelnut, and box two muffins and a bear claw at the same time. Beside him, Dick is working double-time, passing drinks and calling names- fast hands, fast brain, the kid's a great hire, he'll give Bruce that. 

The pre-work morning rush is always the worst. Seven to nine, two hours of rapid-fire orders and praying no-one screws up a drink. (He doesn't know how Diana keeps smiling at the customers when taking orders, but she does.)

"Excuse me."

 _Goddamnit_.

"Excuse me!"

"Gingerbread latte for Roy!" Dick calls, stretching over the heads of the people milling around the end of the counter, setting the drink in plain sight. He sighs. "Yes, sir?"

"I think you got my order wrong." The man sneers. 

_God-damn-it_.

Clark doesn't stop filling orders. Dick can handle this, right?

"What seems to be the matter, sir?" Grayson is the epitome of polite inquiry.

"Caramel macchiato for Arnold!" Clark almost shouts. He wipes his hands on his apron. Diana passes him another couple cups.

The man nearly shoves the cup in Dick's face. 

"I ordered skim milk." He says rudely. "I explicitly said- s-k-i-m milk."

Dick raises his eyebrows, and doesn't say a word.

 _Shit_.

This, unfortunately, only fuels the man's anger.

"This is not skim milk!" He sputters, shaking the cup, increasingly physical. Drops of hot coffee slosh out of the slot in the lid. "This is two-percent! I can taste the difference!"

"Sir, if you ordered skim milk, we gave you skim milk." Dick says. He's not budging.

Clark knows this isn't going to end well. 

(It doesn't.)

Two minutes later, Dick is dripping in hot cappuccino, spitting about idiot customers and goddamn milk, and actual customers with actual money are starting to stare, so Clark graciously shoves Dick into the back with a pointed look at Bruce, who is wrist-deep in chocolate chips- 'he's your hire, take care of him'- before grabbing Kara and tugging her back out behind the counter. She's got flour all over her apron, and protests when he pulls her away from shaping another sheet of cookies, but it doesn't matter, because Diana is already swearing when they get back out.

"Come on, Kent!" She says. Kara rolls her eyes but settles in instantly, grabbing empty cups, making drinks.

Clark settles into the zone- and by zone, he means the zombie-like 'take-order-make-order-hand-off' repetition pattern that has become like a second nature to him after years behind the Detective's Coffee counter.


	3. act iii: "your barista won't accept my coupons!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> next chapter! i might not update that quickly in the coming weeks, bc finals and end-of-year projects and stuff... but ill be back!

Bruce sighs.  
  
Dick is busy cleaning up in the sink, muttering about dickheads and hot coffee and not having a spare set of clothes, though he should be at the point where he keeps some in the back office- Clark and Diana do, and so does Bruce, because food-related defacement of clothing by ornery customers is more common than one would think- and he ends up wearing one of the DC t-shirts they sell in the front, along with a spare apron and Diana's clean set of gym pants, because both Clark and Bruce's clothes are too big.

"I don't know why people romanticize working in coffee shops." Dick grumbles.

Bruce doesn't answer him. 

"Kara's taken over your spot in the front, so you're gonna stay back here." He says instead, gesturing with one flour-coated hand at the abandoned workstation, where the cookie dough Kara had been scooping lies, slowly settling.

"Yeah, 'course." Dick replies. "You know I like bakery duty more than the counter, anyways."

He settles in with the cookies. Bruce watches him out of the corner of his eye while he pours batter into muffin tins.

~~~~~~

By ten am, the morning crowd has- well, not died down, there's still a healthy amount of foot traffic, but it's not nearly as hectic as it had been only two hours prior. 

Clark wipes down the counter. Diana bags a croissant for a young lady with a Macbook and a teal pixie cut. Kara cleans off the nozzles of the syrup bottles.

"I can't wait to go home." Diana groans. She rolls her shoulder. Her wince of discomfort is almost imperceptible.

"Rough night at the roller derby?" Clark asks. Kara looks up and laughs.

"She was awesome, Clark!" She launches into a play-by-play narration of the events of the competition last night, and Clark and Diana smile at her enthusiasm.

"And she threw the other girl right out of the pack!" Kara beams, grinning. "Tim and Conner thought it was badass too, Diana. Especially when you elbowed that girl in the face."

Clark sighs, shaking his head faux-disapprovingly.

"What are you teaching the young ones, Diana?" He says. His voice is resigned, but he's smiling, and his eyes sparkle with humor. "Violence isn't always the answer."

"Yeah, well, the next time Poison Ivy and Harlequin want to talk it out, I'll be sure to invite you to the debate." She snorts. "Dinah took a pretty bad hit, though. You should have seen her cursing at the other team."

"She alright?" Clark asks. 

Diana shrugs. "She's a tough girl, she'll be fine." She says. "We might need to bring in a temp for the next couple matches, though."

Kara lights up. "Can I?" She asks eagerly.

Clark raises his eyebrows in surprise, then shakes his head.

"Absolutely not." He firmly shuts it down. "Diana, she can't."

Diana chuckles and pats Kara on the shoulder.

"Sorry, kiddo." She says. "You're a little young. Maybe after a little more training."

"I already know what my derby name's gonna be!" Kara enthuses, seemingly undeterred by the deflection. "You're Wonder Woman, Dinah's Black Canary, Helena is Huntress, Karen is Power Girl- I'm gonna be Supergirl!"

Clark frowns. Supergirl.

Diana smiles. "You got it." She says. "Train hard."

Kara beams at her. Clark rolls his eyes and fills another order.

"Vanilla latte for Valley." He calls out.

~~~~~~

Bruce looks up when Clark walks into the kitchen.

"Hey." He says. "It get quiet out there?"

Clark sighs. "Yeah."

"Well, good, you can help me with these cakes." It's always funny to Clark, seeing Bruce like this- he's a big guy, broad shoulders, intimidating jawline, sharp eyes, and he's in a flour-covered apron, piping little yellow roses delicately onto the tops of tiny cakes. "Grab a bag."

Sure enough, there's a half-empty icing bag full of blue frosting, and Clark picks it up, finishing a couple of the cakes by doing a blue rose the size of his fingertip next to the yellow. The pastels contrast gently with the chocolate glaze.

"Dick ditch you?" Clark smiles.

Bruce rolls his eyes. "Apparently he has a lunch date with Kory." He says. 

"Ah, young love." Clark grins and nudges Bruce. "Do you remember what that was like?"

Bruce shoves him back, huffing. "Yeah. The thing with Selina was a bit of a disaster, if you recall." 

He's right. Selina, his high-school sweetheart. 

"Hmm." Clark says. "Thinking about high school makes me think about Lois."

"Lois Lane." Bruce does smile now. "How is she?"

"On assignment in Morocco, I think." Clark sighs. "She's probably the only journalism major I know who's actually working now."

Bruce chuckles, resuming piping, hands steady. "That's what you get for majoring in liberal arts." He says.

Well, he's right. Nobody's hiring journalists right now.

"Yeah, yeah." Clark elbows him and picks up his icing bag again. He glances at Bruce- as always, he's completely focused on the task at hand, eyebrows barely furrowed.

Bruce, as though he can tell he's being watched, looks up.

"What?" He says.

Clark blinks, and shakes his head.

"Nothing." He replies. "Let's finish these cakes."

~~~~~~

"Ma'am." Diana sounds more invested in not throttling the woman in front of her than in solving the issue at hand. "Ma'am, these coupons cannot be used in conjunction with one another." She looks at the slips of torn-up paper in her hand. "And this one is expired."

"The Starbucks two blocks down made an exception!" The woman says, sounding increasingly irate, brandishing more coupons in Diana's face. Diana's calm expression is more frightening than an angry one would be, because the blankness in her face and the steadiness of her breathing all point to her being ready to deck this lady. 

"Ma'am, we can't accept these coupons-" Diana begins again.

"Is there a problem here?" Bruce comes out of the kitchen, dusting off his apron. "What seems to be the matter?"

"This nutjob wants to use three-year-old coupons." Diana mutters. "Lord help me."

"I'll run interference." Bruce replies softly. He clears his throat. 

"Finally!" The woman says loudly. "Are you the manager?"

Bruce blinks for a second.

"Uh." He says. "Yes, I'm the manager. What seems the be the issue, ma'am?"

"Your barista won't accept my coupons!" The woman shrieks. She points to the papers on the counter.

Bruce makes a show of frowning at them.

"Ma'am, these coupons expired months ago." He says, firmly. "I'm sorry, but we can't accept them." There's a line starting to build behind her. She refuses to budge.

"They were printed by your shop!" She says. "You have to accept them!"

"We don't have to accept anything." Bruce replies. "I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to ask you to leave."

The woman fumes, and sputters for a moment.

"Well," she finally exclaims, "Do you know how much money I spend here? I have never- never! Been so disrespected!" She tosses her coupons at them. "I will never be coming back here, and you've lost a customer. I hope you're happy." 

She storms out. The customers behind her sigh in relief. Diana crosses her arms.

Bruce scrubs a hand across his face.

"Jesus." He says. "Why do they always use that line?"

Diana scowls.

**Author's Note:**

> NOTE: thanks for reading! to be continued. [i'm on tumblr.](http://serpentinej.tumblr.com)


End file.
